The personal touch is a given

Tuesday

Bryan McCauley of the UnPaved Clothing Co. of Upper Southampton owns a thick volume of sketches and notes that represents the resolution of many an identity crisis.

McCauley and his wife, Tammy, specialize in personalization projects as small as a kid’s birthday party and as big as a fundraiser at Trenton’s Waterfront Park.

“You can order one shirt or 1,000 shirts from us,” said Bryan.

Their medium is vinyl and heat-press transfers that are applied to T-shirts, mechanic shirts, tank tops and hats. In addition to the personalized items, eight product lines, including 31 original designs, are sold on the company’s website, www.unpavedclothing.com, with free shipping.

The company is a collaboration between Tammy, who trained in fine arts, and her husband, who is self-taught. The company is Web-based for now, but the couple doesn't rule out opening a bricks-and-mortar shop.

The two aspired “to create our own branded line,” said Bryan, who uses high-tech computer-assisted design and cutting techniques.

“You hear airbrushing and heat transfer, and you think 1980s Wildwood,” he said. “The process has gotten so much better.”

Glitter, reflective materials and textural treatments can be applied to fabric, as can children’s drawings, if not overly detailed.

“We love the personal touch,” said Tammy. “That’s a standard for us. It’s not an option, it’s a given.”

Bryan consults with clients in search of defining symbols; from there, he devises a logotype.

Sometimes, clients scrawl their own ideas on whatever’s at hand. “It starts out with this little piece of paper — a dragon wing (for example) — and it comes to life,” he said.

The high-tech equipment allows logos to be adjusted proportionally for shirts of different sizes, which comes in handy for events such as family reunions, where both child and adult sizes may be needed.

While new shirts are the mainstay, the McCauleys are launching RePaved Clothing, a line of “upcycled” second-hand items that they say “are in need of sprucing up for a second life.”

The company also will upcycle clients’ own clothes.

“If there’s a stain on it, we can cover the stain,” said Bryan. “We like to think of it as tattooing the clothes.”

The couple say some projects have brought them “out of our comfort zone,” such as costuming for a horror movie — a genre they don’t watch.

UnPaved Clothing made shirts for a cinematic biker gang in a fright film involving wrestler/actor Gene “Snitsky” Snisky in Nesquahoning, Pa.; the company also produces a “Snitsky Swag” line of shirts the wrestler helped design.

The company is associated with a number of charities, imprinting and selling T-shirts for Marine Sgt. Enrique Trevino’s “1 Million Pushups in 1 Year” campaign. UnPaved Clothing donates all money raised to the Wounded Warrior Project.

The company also sponsored two recent fundraisers for autism charities run by Anthony “Tattoo Tony” Rodriguez, a celebrity tattoo artist in New Jersey who’s associated with Poison frontman Bret Michaels.

“We just keep meeting really good people,” said Bryan.

Among them were the founders of the Louis T. Savino III Foundation, a Lower Makefield-based group that raises money to place automated external defibrillators in youth-sports settings.

“Bryan took a look at our website and designed a logo that was very appropriate for our organization,” said co-founder Lorraine Sikora.

UnPaved Clothing also supplied materials for the fundraiser at Waterfront Park, “and they came up with ideas of things that we could sell in terms of logo branding they created,” said Sikora. “They delivered a beautiful product at the end. They really took the time to make certain that that was what we got. It makes you want to return to that particular vendor."

Among their design influences is “good karma,” according to the McCauleys. “We’re trying to live what we say,” said Tammy.

Gwen Shrift is a feature writer at the Bucks County Courier Times. Phone: 215-949-4204. Email: gshrift@phillyburbs.com

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